Election Name: | December 1910 United Kingdom general election |
Country: | United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland |
Type: | parliamentary |
Ongoing: | no |
Previous Election: | January 1910 United Kingdom general election |
Previous Year: | Jan 1910 |
Previous Mps: | List of MPs elected in the United Kingdom general election, January 1910 |
Next Election: | 1918 United Kingdom general election |
Next Year: | 1918 |
Seats For Election: | All 670 seats in the House of Commons |
Majority Seats: | 336 |
Elected Mps: | List of MPs elected in the United Kingdom general election, December 1910 |
Leader1: | H. H. Asquith |
Leader Since1: | 30 April 1908 |
Party1: | Liberal Party (UK) |
Leaders Seat1: | East Fife |
Last Election1: | 274 seats, 43.5% |
Seats1: | 272 |
Seat Change1: | 2 |
Popular Vote1: | 2,157,256 |
Percentage1: | 44.2% |
Swing1: | 0.7% |
Leader2: | Arthur Balfour |
Leader Since2: | 11 June 1902 |
Party2: | Conservative and Liberal Unionist |
Leaders Seat2: | City of London |
Last Election2: | 272 seats, 46.8% |
Seats2: | 271 |
Seat Change2: | 1 |
Popular Vote2: | 2,270,753 |
Percentage2: | 46.6% |
Swing2: | 0.3% |
Leader4: | John Redmond |
Leader Since4: | 6 February 1900 |
Party4: | Irish Parliamentary Party |
Leaders Seat4: | Waterford City |
Last Election4: | 71 seats, 1.2% |
Seats4: | 74 |
Seat Change4: | 3 |
Popular Vote4: | 90,416 |
Percentage4: | 1.9% |
Swing4: | 0.7% |
Leader5: | George Barnes |
Leader Since5: | 14 February 1910 |
Party5: | Labour Party (UK) |
Leaders Seat5: | Glasgow Blackfriars and Hutchesontown |
Last Election5: | 40 seats, 7.0% |
Seats5: | 42 |
Seat Change5: | 2 |
Popular Vote5: | 309,963 |
Percentage5: | 6.4% |
Swing5: | 0.6% |
Map Size: | 400px |
Prime Minister | |
Posttitle: | Prime Minister after election |
Before Election: | H. H. Asquith |
Before Party: | Liberal Party (UK) |
After Election: | H. H. Asquith |
After Party: | Liberal Party (UK) |
Turnout: | 81.6% |
Map2 Image: | File:December 1910 UK GE Westminster diagram.svg |
Map2 Caption: | Composition of the House of Commons after the election. |
The December 1910 United Kingdom general election was held from 3 to 19 December. It was the last general election to be held over several days and the last to be held before the First World War.
The election took place following the efforts of the Liberal government to pass its People's Budget in 1909, which raised taxes on the wealthy to fund social welfare programmes. The 1909 budget was only agreed to by the House of Lords in April 1910 after the January general election in which the Liberals and the Irish Parliamentary Party gained a majority. The Government called a further election in December 1910 to get a mandate for the Parliament Act 1911, which would prevent the House of Lords from permanently blocking legislation linked to money bills ever again, and to obtain King George V's agreement to threaten to create sufficient Liberal peers to pass that act (in the event this did not prove necessary, as the Lords voted to curtail their own powers).
The Conservative Party, led by Arthur Balfour with their Liberal Unionist allies, and the Liberal Party, led by Prime Minister H. H. Asquith, almost exactly repeated the numerical result produced in the January election, with the Conservatives again winning the largest number of votes. The Liberal Party under Asquith remained in government with the support of the Irish Parliamentary Party. This was the last election in which the Liberals won the highest number of seats in the House of Commons. It was also the last United Kingdom general election in which a party other than Labour or the Conservatives won the most seats.
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Both the Liberals and the Conservatives won 272 seats, however the Liberals remained the largest party due to the Speaker having been Conservative, meaning they sat with 271 MPs.
The Liberals, still lacking a parliamentary majority, again went into coalition with the Irish Parliamentary Party, who insisted on a Home Rule Bill as a condition of coalition.